


The Free Stag and the Lion King

by Ruunkur



Series: The Teller of Stories [1]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Fire Emblem: Three Houses Golden Deer Route, M/M, Sad Stories, Soft story telling, happy endings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-19
Updated: 2021-02-19
Packaged: 2021-03-16 02:09:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29568696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ruunkur/pseuds/Ruunkur
Summary: Come and listen to the teller of stories, and the words he weaves.Come and hear the tale of the Stag and the Lion.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Claude von Riegan
Series: The Teller of Stories [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2187090
Comments: 6
Kudos: 24





	The Free Stag and the Lion King

**Author's Note:**

  * For [marmaladeSkies](https://archiveofourown.org/users/marmaladeSkies/gifts).



> Yooo, shout out to the best beta reader I've had and who loves to listen to my stories and ideas, MarmaladeSkies.

“Come one, come all. And let me tell you a tale.”

The man leaned down, smiling at the children. His hair is brown, shining in the sun. The desert heat swells around him, the coolness of the shade beckoning to any passerbys.

The children paused, looking at the man in the market square. His voice was silky, eyes glinting in the sun.

“What kind of story do you have, mister?”

The man smiled, offering them a sweeping bow. “What of a story of the country beyond the throat? From a land of magic, of beings that become beasts? Of a war that ripped apart a world they all once knew?”

The children were thick around the man now, crowding into the shade. They had heard of this teller of stories, of the one that would bring tales none other knew. Many children looked for him, but it was rare that his visits happened.

They clammered around him, begging for the story and the man sat on a stool he had brought with him, his hands spreading wide.

“Do you children know of Fodlan?”

The name was heavy on his tongue, his voice low as if he was speaking of another world. The children drew closer, nodding their agreements. The news of the war had reached them, but the Fodlanis had sorted out their own mess.

Few stories reached them, but their king had returned, taken the throne, and forged peace.

“This story is about the Free Stag and the Lion King.”

The man’s eyes sparkled and one of the children cleared her throat. “Is it a… love story?” she whispers, hesitant to interrupt the man.

The man smiled, though it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “This is a sad love story.”

The children grew silent, drawing in their breaths and holding them. The man made a grand gesture, capturing the audience’s attention fully.

“This is a story, a love story of sorts, between the Free Stag and the Lion King. The pair, for they were men, not animals as one would think, knew each other…” He closed his eyes taking a small breath.

 _It was said that the story begins_ when a proud eagle declared war on the Kingdom of the Lion and the Alliance of the Stag. But what many people don’t remember is there was a time before. When the Eagle, the Lion, and the Stag worked together, learned together.

For they were sent to an academy. One where they would learn many things. The Stag, as a rule, was a strange character. He hid himself away from the others, only offering what he wanted many to see.

He kept up a mask, certain that any wrong move would be the one that would cause him to be forced to flee. The Stag was afraid, but what he didn’t know was that the Eagle and the Lion were equally afraid, each for their own reasons.

Life had been left cruel scars on each of the three future rulers, leaving them to handle traumas and troubles of their own. While these three young students suffered under the stress, another was to come into their lives and make them question their convictions

This figure, who would be known by many names, would offer a hand only to one. The Stag was surprised when the hand was offered, but he took it. It would be the first person he could fully trust.

This figure, known as the Sword, would join the Stag and guide his path. Each step would be dogged, by what neither could see. As the dance through the year began, the Stag would learn many things.

He would learn trust and he would learn war.

He made his way through the school year, trying to keep his head above water. While he struggled, another came that was not directed by the Sword. The Lion would gift the Stag something he would have never considered.

He would give him a heart.

And he would break it in turn.

As it was said at the beginning of the story, this is a sad one. The Stag would grow fond of the Lion, in their days during school. The Stag’s own house, filled with people from his Alliance -not his birthplace, but his secondary home that grew to mean much to him- soon grew to include others that felt they could find peace in his home.

The Stag welcomed the distraction, learning each of those that came into his fold. They wanted to escape, for just a moment, their own lives and duties, their own chains that shackled them.

But what no one knew was that joining the Stag was something else entirely. It was something not even the Stag knew at the time.

While the others joined his herd, finding safety among the many people, he noticed that only a handful wouldn’t congregate around the Sword.

Their deaths would be mourned, but they would never be forgotten.

One day, before the season turned cold, he was out for a midnight stroll and he found the Lion, pacing in the courtyard. He was bristling, teeth bared and his voice low. The stag, even as he approached, could hardly parse out the spoken words.

When he inched too close, the Lion froze, standing up and replacing his princely mask. He offered a small bow to the Stag, offered apologies as well.

The Stag waved them off, accepting none of them as he extended a hand. They exchanged names, names that many dare not speak, and they spoke to each other. While neither told the other of their troubles, they found a peace settling in between them.

When the dawn began to rise, their conversation evaporated and they drifted their separate ways.

But neither forgot their promise and soon, their nightly visits became commonplace. They would speak to each other of things that made no sense to anyone outside of their shared space. The Lion spoke of things that he had buried, while the Stag offered none of his own secrets.

He gave the Lion enough to satisfy him, ensuring him that there was nothing else, but he hid the darkest parts of himself, the ones that had been cut off and left behind. Even talking to the Lion, it felt like a little piece of him had recovered.

And it was here, under the night sky of this foreign land, that the Stag first kissed the Lion. It was cold and they were speaking of moving their meetings elsewhere. Perhaps a place warmer than the courtyard. The Stag had stepped forward, placing a hand on the Lion’s shoulder. He locked eyes with him, spoke words that were nowhere near as meaningless as the manner he spoke them in would suggest. He leaned forward, breaching the distance and he kiss the Lion.

The Lion let the shock melt through him, feeling the heat in his cheeks rise. He did not kiss the Stag back that night, citing that it was late and they would need to go to sleep soon. Talking near nightly to dawn was bad for them, the Lion had once joked.

But the meetings eased the nightmares for the both of them, giving them something to hold onto in the darkest parts of the night.

The Lion called a halt to their meetings after that night, though there was pain laced through his voice. The Stag nodded, shrugging off the statement with a wave of his hand. It didn’t matter to him, honestly. The kiss had been a farce to begin with, he had claimed.

But there was a sharp pain in his chest, an ache he couldn’t explain as he watched the Lion’s retreating back.

It would be two weeks before they spoke again, running into each other at the midwinter ball. It was a festival, for the construction of the monastery. And there was a dance that he offered.

The dance to the Lion was a gamble but the acceptance filled him with warmth. It was a warmth the Stag hadn’t felt in the few weeks since he and the Lion had stopped speaking. It was a warmth he was uncertain he could feel again.

The Stag beckoned the Lion up to a tower. For this tower had a myth lingering about.

It was said that the tower of Fodlan’s distance goddess was a place where promises came true.The Stag wanted to promise the Lion his heart, uncertain if the other would reject it.

He prepared the statement, clasping the Lion’s hand in his own, speaking softly. The words are lost, of what the Stag and Lion said, for they were only heard by the stars far above.

_”Was it words of love?”_

_“Shut up, Aliya, you interrupted the storyteller!”_

_“It’s okay, children. It was words of love, Aliya.”_

As it seems with all stories, after a moment of love, a tragedy befell the school. The father of the Sword was murdered and the students took up arms. They were on guard, but soon their enemy showed their face.

To the woods the students, the Stag, and the Sword did travel. Here, they fought off many things they did not understand. And the Sword was thought lost to a space neither understood. But the Sword returned to them, blessed by a goddess on a distant star. The Sword was different, but also the same.

And the students trudged on. More and more unsettling things came until, at last, the pressure broke. The proud Eagle, who had kept her head down for most of the year, keeping her opinions to herself, reared back, showing her claws.

War settled around them and the Free Stag and the Lion King saw each other less. On the eve before the Eagle would strike the academy, the lovers met up once more at the tower. There, they made a second promise to each other. They spoke a binding agreement, that no matter what lay before, they would meet up again.

In five years, the Stag and his herd would return to the academy, to set the broken stones right. But that night, it was their night. They would seek company in each other. The Stag and the Lion left their parting with a kiss and a promise, setting about to join the fight as the sun broke the horizon, dancing brightly in the clear sky.

In the fight, the Sword was lost and a dragon brought down. None knew from where the dragon came, but they felt the loss. The dragon had offered them a path to freedom and they had been able to seize it, in what little time they had.

And the war would continue, neither side gaining ground while neither side lost. It was five years of a held breath, tension waiting to snap, of waiting for the dam to break.

But it broke, in the end, as all things must break under strain.

The Stag, holding true to his word, returned to the academy and met several others there. He was disheartened but unsurprised when the Lion had not returned. He heard from the others that he had been put to sword, slaughtered by a mage. His kingdom fallen, his soldiers cut loose, the Lion lay rotting.

The Stag struggled to not let this affect him. He hid the pain down below, working towards ending the war. With the Sword returned, their path became clear. They strike out, leave the academy, and turn the tides of war.

On the battlefield, they discover a striking faction. On the battlefield where the Stag and the Eagle clashed, a third army joined them. The Lion returned from the dead, but lay broken in the mind. He joined the fray and it was with desperation that the Stag faced off both armies. With no way to communicate with him, they fell.

And so the Lion King was said to have died on the field. The Stag grieved in private, speaking to none of his promise to the Lion. He laid down flowers at a grave of his own making as the war raged.

In the end, the war was put to bed and peace settled. It would soon be time for the Stag to return home and so he left the Fodlani lands in the hands of the newly crowned Archbishop, the once known Sword.

But, before he fled Fodlan, the Stag returned to the academy, heading to the tower to speak of a promise once more to the stars. A promise that would never be fulfilled as his _lover, the Lion King, was dead._

The children pull back from the speaker as he stands, a smile on his face. His eyes were dancing, his body warm from the sun above. He relished in the looks of wonder, his heart warm. “What do you think?”

“Fodlan is full of sad people.” The girl who had spoken before looked up, blinking at the man.

“The war makes for many sad people, Aliya.” The storyteller offered the children a bow. “Now, get on to your parents before they come looking for you.”

The children scurried off as another man stepped into the shade, offering the storyteller his arm.

“What did you tell them this time?”

The storyteller winked, turning to the man. “Just a story of how a stag and a lion fell in love.”

The man smiled, his eye crinkling in the corner. “It was a lovely story.”

“Thank you.” The storyteller raised the man’s hand to his lips, kissing it.

The pair left the quieting marketplace, returning down a dusty road to their home in the distance.


End file.
